looked
so strange that she thought she had offended him. "Please don't mind
telling me. I should understand everything--everything. Was it some
one you loved--once?" It was hard for her to say it, but she said it
bravely.

"No. I never loved any one in all the world, Rosalie--not till I loved
you."

She gave a happy sigh. "Oh, it is wonderful!" she said. "It is wonderful
and good! Did you--did you love me from the very first?"

"I think I did, though I didn't know it from the very first," he
answered slowly. His heart beat hard, for he could not guess how she
should know of Kathleen. It was absurdly impossible that she should
know. "But many have loved you!" she said proudly. "They have not shown
it," he answered grimly; then added quickly, and with aching anxiety:
"When did you hear of--of Kathleen?"

"Oh, you are such a blind huntsman!" she laughed. "Don't you know where
my little fox was hiding? Why, in the shop, when you held the note-paper
up to the light, and looked startled, and bought all the paper we had
that was water-marked Kathleen. Do you think that was clever of me? I
don't."

"I think it was very clever," he said.

"Then she-Kathleen--doesn't really matter?" she asked eagerly. "Of
course she can't, if you don't love her. But does she love you? Did she
ever love you?" "Never in her life."

"So of course it doesn't matter," she rejoined. "Hush!" she added
rapidly. "I see some one coming in the trees yonder. It may be some one
for me. Father knows I come here sometimes. Go quickly and hide behind
the rocks, please. I'll stay and see who it is. Please go--dearest."

He kissed her, and, keeping out of sight, got to a place of safety a few
hundred feet away.

He saw the new-comer run to Rosalie, speak to her, saw Rosalie half
turn in his own direction, then go hastily down the hillside with the
messenger.

"It is her father!" he exclaimed, and followed at a distance. At the
village he learned that M. Evanturel had had another seizure.

CHAPTER XLV. SIX MONTHS GO BY

Spring again--budding trees and flowing sap; the earth banks removed
from the houses, and outside windows discarded; the ice tumbling and
crunching in the river; the dormant farmer raising his head to the
energy and delight of April.

The winter had been long and hard. Never had there been severer frost or
deeper snow, and seldom had big game been so plentiful. In the snug warm
stables the cattle munched and chewed the cud; t